Today's News

After serving as Lancaster County’s Democratic clerk of court for 18 years, Jeff Hammond revealed Thursday that he was joining the GOP.
“Today, I am announcing that I will seek re-election in 2020 as a member of the Republican Party,” the 60-year-old Lancaster native told an applauding, standing-room-only crowd in the Historic Lancaster County Courthouse.
County GOP Chair Sandy McGarry, who had publicly targeted Hammond for defeat in 2020, cheered his decision and pledged her party’s commitment to keeping him in office.

After a four-day trial, jurors convicted a Kershaw man of reckless homicide Thursday in the 2015 death of his fiancée, and he was sentenced to six years in prison.
William Bryan Reese, 46, remained calm Thursday afternoon as the jury’s verdict was read at the Lancaster County Courthouse and Circuit Judge Thomas Russo delivered the sentence, less than the 10-year maximum.
The victim, Rae Marie Brewer, 45, died on the way to the hospital Dec. 16, 2015, after Reese’s Ford F450 rolled over her on his family’s Kershaw farm.

The city of Lancaster’s preliminary budget for fiscal 2019-20 is nearly $3 million less than last year’s and $9 million less than the year before that.
City Finance Director Dana Pinkert presented the recommended budget of approximately $25 million to city council during a special council meeting Tuesday evening.
“We had to deal with losing the tax dollars from the hospital,” she said. “We’re anticipating lower tax dollars, so we had to make some reductions.”

Lancaster County and the city of Lancaster have joined forces to make more than $100,000 in improvements to Wylie Street Pool and the surrounding area, including a new playground and picnic shelter.
City council member Kenny Hood was one of the proponents of the project.

A Lancaster High School student has been suspended for the rest of the school year and charged by police after he was accused of repeatedly punching a classmate.
The 17-year-old was arrested Wednesday for misdemeanor assault and battery after a phone video taken by another student in the class surfaced. The incident happened Tuesday in an LHS classroom.
The victim was hit six times in the right arm, but didn’t fight back or report the incident, said Bryan Vaughn, safety and transportation director for the county school district.

A Heath Springs man was killed Wednesday evening in a one-vehicle crash near Primus Crossroads in eastern Lancaster County.
Deputy Coroner Lynette Walker identified the victim as 42-year-old Robert Blake Crimminger.
Walker said the wreck happened on Pleasant Road, which runs from S.C. 522 near High Point Baptist Church to the intersection of S.C. 903.
S.C. Highway Patrol Lance Cpl. Gary Miller said Crimminger was headed west in a 1999 Chevrolet pickup about 6:50 p.m. Wednesday when he ran off the road. The truck hit a tree and caught fire.

Today through Tuesday, abnormally high temperatures may break local records dating back to the early 1900s.
Some meteorologists this week blamed a “heat ridge” for the forecast.
“What people are referring to when they talk about a heat ridge is there’s a large ridge of high pressure that’s going to be across the Southeast over the next several days,” said National Weather Service meteorologist Leonard Vaughan.

INDIAN LAND – After two years of surviving with 20 percent kidney function, Luke Brown might finally have the chance to live a normal life.
During Erin Brown’s pregnancy, her doctors noticed a red flag – her baby’s bladder was larger than normal.

The Buford High School Multipurpose Building was the setting of a happy celebration Thursday night as several Lancaster Adult Education graduates walked across the stage to receive their diplomas and degrees, cheered on by friends and family members.
Only a few of the 35 students graduating this year were able to attend the ceremony, but the celebration was just as joyous with the small number gathered.
The Rev. Eddie Boykin was the commencement speaker for the occasion and congratulated the graduates on their accomplishments.